agonyaunt | (no subject)

DEAR ABBY: My in-laws constantly invite themselves to stay at our home. Hubby's mom has a rule that guests strip their beds the morning they leave. This is something I don't, as the hostess, want them to do. They know it, but give me constant grief about it. Recently, my sister-in-law went ahead and stripped the sheets. I didn't realize it until after they left. It made me feel disrespected.

What should I do about them mowing over my boundary? (Hubs sides with them, but frankly, he is a momma's boy). What do I say next time the cheapos (oops, the "thrifty travelers") ask to stay? By the way, I have never stayed in their home. -- TRAMPLED BOUNDARY

DEAR TRAMPLED: I don't blame you for being annoyed. It is time to have a talk with your sister-in-law to explain how offended you were that she disregarded your wishes when she visited. Tell her it made you feel disrespected, and that if it happens again, you'd prefer she stay elsewhere. She may not like it, but it's your turf, your rules.

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Abby completely misses the mark here.

LW's not upset that these people strip the beds before leaving when they visit. LW doesn't want them to visit at all. This is obvious from the language used - these in-laws are "cheap", they "constantly invite themselves to stay", and Husband is a "momma's boy", which is a closely related secondary issue.

And LW can't say shit to them without Husband undermining it!

That's the problem. The sheets are a nonissue. If LW was happy to see them every visit then it'd just be one weird family quirk of theirs. Whatever, nothing to get worked up over.

I'm inclined to make a radical suggestion, as always: If LW has problems with unwanted guests, LW needs to get rid of the guest room. No spare bed? No spare guests! Turn that room into a sewing room, a workout room, a home office (with no bed), a storage space - do it quickly and without asking Husband for advice. After all, he never asks before allowing Mom and Sis and the whole family to stay. Drive the bed over to Goodwill, get it all swapped over in one day. This may require hiring help and will definitely require friends, some to keep Husband occupied and some to repaint.

No guest room = no guests.

Of course, what this will do for their marriage is another question, but honestly, it's not one I'm interested in.

you are SO on target here - Abby completely missed the point, and the In-laws Stay Free space needs to vanish. problem solved! (that one, at least)

What do I say next time the cheapos (oops, the "thrifty travelers") ask to stay?

"No" is a full sentence. But LW doesn't need to talk to the in-laws; she needs to talk to her husband about his refusal to stand up for her against the in-laws. Make it clear that if it continues, he'll need to find another place to stay too.

It's the old classic, "You don't have an in-law problem, you have a significant other problem". There should be a nice embroidery sampler or something framed on the wall that advice columnists smarter than this one could just point to.

I grew up with the idea that stripping the bed is decent houseguest behavior, because of course the host needs to wash the sheets after you leave, and you the guest make their task a little easier by taking the sheets off the bed yourself. So my first read of this letter is "WTF is your problem, LW?????? You were going to leave dirty sheets on the bed for your next houseguest????"

That said, yeah, clearly the real problem is that LW doesn't want her in-laws staying in her house at all. ETA: and her husband isn't supporting her wishes.

Edited 2023-09-16 13:27 (UTC)

My guess was that she doesn't want the bed stripped Tuesday morning if that isn't laundry day. Maybe she dislikes the look of a pile of laundry on the bed, and doesn't need the reminder that they will need washing.If that was the issue, the answer would be something like "tell your husband that he is responsible for laundering the sheets after his family leave, or for getting them from that pile on the bed into the laundry room" [if all laundry is agreed to be her job].

But I would also like to know whether "hubs [sic] sides with them" means that he agrees about stripping the bed, that he insists on having them stay despite her wishes, or both. It's not clear to me whether the problem is just "they all think it's a silly quirk that I don't want the bed stripped before laundry day" or "he's dumping a bunch of unwanted houseguests and extra work on me."

Ah, that makes sense.

And yep, there's definitely some missing information here.

Yeah, I was raised that you make the bed but don't strip it, because the hosts might not want to do the laundry immediately after you leave, and keeping sheets/blankets on the bed protects the mattress (especially if you have pets or smokers.) I wonder of LW has attempted to explain this, and/or if the actual conflict is that in-laws imply she is slovenly for not washing them immediately or that she thinks they're implying that.

I have since picked up that strip the bed seems to be more common in some places so I tend to check in with the hosts. (I have to basically pull the sheets off to find my socks anyway...)

But the actual underlying issue here is that LW and in-laws have zero respect for each other and husband isn't siding with wife, because this should be a nonissue if they weren't already at BEC level.

It would bother me if houseguests did this because 1) they’re my guests, it isn’t their responsibility to do my housework, and 2) I don’t like bare mattresses because the cats like to sleep on the beds and I don’t want them getting fur on the bare mattress. So now I _immediately_ need to put the second set of clean sheets on rather than doing it at my convenience.

Perfect solution!

That also makes sense!

I don’t like bare mattresses because the cats like to sleep on the beds and I don’t want them getting fur on the bare mattress

This is exactly why I don't want people doing it! (If they ask, I'm happy to tell them no, and I'm very happy they asked, and they get the mental gold star.)

Yes, in this house we wash the sheets/put fresh sheets on the guest bed immediately before the guest is about to sleep in it, because the cats are going to sleep on the bed and get fur all over it (and also potentially other gross substances) and you can't just leave the bed made with clean sheets and expect them to still be clean when the next person needs the bed. So someone stripping the bed actually has made more work for me twice: not only do I need to remake the bed with clean sheets now for cat protection, I'm going to have to change the sheets before the next guest stay even though nobody but the cats slept on them!

Sounds to me as though LW is picking a specific fight in order to feel in control, rather than actually to pursue a solution. There may be a legitimate beef in there somewhere, but she sounds very unpleasant. Also I am glad this came up because I just realized I had not dealt with the sheets after our last overnight guest, and I am doing laundry today anyway.

I like your solution.